11

The Winchester Brothers could not walk past a newsstand without one or two tabloid magazines claiming that they busted Supergirl's identity. The Sun claimed she was Britney Spears; the Examiner claimed that she was Reese Witherspoon. Time Magazine had run an article calling her the most intriguing paranormal mystery of the Twenty-First Century. In their article, special effects experts, sociologists, paranormal researchers and professional debunkers had analyzed the on-going phenomenon, debated the sightings and witness testimonies and came out with a neutral conclusion. There was a chance that the Supergirl entity existed, but the evidence also showed a high chance for fraud and invalid accounts. The only people who did not need to be convinced she existed were her fans and the witnesses. In some cities in the United States, criminal activity had decreased by as much as ten to fifteen percent after her appearance. In St. Louis, Missouri, a known cat burglar named Mark James Hackett had entered Prestige Jewelers through the roof. From the top of the building, he had opened an large air conditioner vent, tied off rope gear meant for mountaineering and then dropped himself down into the vent and descended the five floors for the jewelry story on the bottom. Maneuvering through the darkened maze of vents and grills, he surpassed the jewelry store's security system and reached their vault, but as he reached to detach the exterior vent from inside the wall, a powerful force grabbed a hold of his line and pulled him up and out of the vent banging into the sides, slamming into the sides and screaming as he was lurched out of the structure. When he finally regained her his mental faculties, he was tied and wrapped up tightly to the cell phone tower outside at eighty feet off the ground. Floating before him high off the building, Bridget held suspended before him with a look of disappointment on her face.

"Hi, pudding…" She said it sarcastically. "Don't get up, I see you're a bit tied up right now." She dropped as if she was falling, but she was actually using gravity to pick up enough momentum to carry her across the Mississippi and toward the East Coast.

"The last name on your list, Earl?" Randy Hickey looked to his brother.

"The last name on my list." Earl looked back to his brother from the driver's seat of their classic Mustang. "Mr. James Leon Cooley, 644 Elmhurst Drive…" They were residents of Garden City of Camden County, Maryland. It was called the Trailer Park Capital of the United States, and for the last several years, Earl was trying to fix his karma by making a list of everyone he had did wrong and either apologizing or fixing his mistake. The last name on Earl's list was Mr. Cooley of Turner's Grade near the Maryland-West Virginia State Line. It had taken some time and research, but Earl had finally tracked down Cooley through five previous addresses. The last was a ramshackle ranch house on Rural Route 13 just north of Turner's Grade near the highway out of Hagerstown. The property was surrounded by a chain-link fence and was littered with beer cans around a tree that had a chain around it for a missing dog. What mattered was that Earl had found the last name on his list. A big grin on his face, he ambled past the huge SUV parked in the driveway, let himself through the gate and followed the light of the porch light on the front landing. It was almost midnight and with the big tree in the front yard, they couldn't see the stars over head. Randy noticed they didn't see any neighbors either. It was just this one house out in the middle of open rambling hillside land. Earl knocked encouragingly at the front door glad to have reached his last name. From inside the house, a hound dog started barking, there was a clatter of beer cans and beer bottles and Jimmy "Junkyard Jim" Cooley arrived in the open door at all of six feet tall and balding brown hair. His thick brown mustache concealed the annoyed grimace of his lips. His thick eyebrows furrowed over his ice blue eyes.

"Yeah?" He stood there in the door with an open half-empty beer in his hand. A John Wayne Army movie played inside the house.

"Mr. Cooley, I don't know if you remember me…." Earl spoke up earnestly. "But my name is Earl Hickey from Garden City of Camden County, Maryland…."

"Trailer Park Capital of the US…" Randy added.

"But a couple of years ago I was racing a trans-am down Ellsworth Avenue…."

"In Camden County…." Randy added again.

"And I might have side-swiped you a bit in the race… causing you to plow through the playground and through the McDonalds. " Earl continued. "I was just wanted to find you and apologize. I never meant for that to happen. I should have stopped and seen that you were all right."

"That was you…" Cooley knew that day very well. There was not a day that didn't go by that he did not think of that accident. "I spent a day in jail because of that accident. The cops said I was drinking. Lost my job and my wife as a result…."

"Oh…" Earl and Randy exchanged looks. "Sorry to hear that. Is there anything we can do to make to up to you?"

"Yeah…" Cooley got a weird sort of grin on his face. "Just wait right here a minute…" He turned away from the door and stroked his hound dog on the way to his dining room in back. Earl beamed a big grin to his brother.

"It feels like my karma is finally getting better!" He grinned. He heard the sound of a shotgun getting cocked. It expelled a spent shell, took two new ones and was held up toward Earl and Randy. The two Camden County took the sight of the shotgun aimed at them to start screaming. Cooley squeezed the trigger and the blast took out a branch on the tree in the front yard. The two guys from Camden County were racing back for their car outside the fence. Randy dived through the passenger window. Earl very quickly restarted the engine as Cooley's lousy aim took out his side window.

"Where's your karma?" Randy was down in the floor of the front seat.

"Maybe it just takes a minute to reboot!" Earl was hunched down and trying to drive over the dashboard. "You know… like the clock on the microwave."

Cooley's huge black Ford truck shot out of his driveway, crushed a few bushes across the street and righted itself to give chase. His shotgun was reloaded and he had three more in the rack in his back window. Driving with his right hand, he extended his left hand with his shotgun out the window and readied his aim. As his speedometer hastened up to eighty miles an hour, he barreled down on the Mustang trying the skirt him in the distance. He fired and the back window of it exploded into shards of glass.

"Earl, hit the gas!"

"I've got the pedal to the medal as it is!" He had the same face he had when he saw those two old people having sex at the old folks home. It was a mixture of shock and fear. "Trust me! I've got a lot of good karma coming my way!"

Cooley blasted a stop sign on the turn. On the other side, Earl's Mustang jumped a small dip in the road. Cooley's huge gas-guzzler hit the same dip and was launched just a bit higher into the air. The shells in his chosen shotgun spent, he took down the deer rifle from behind him. As he reached for it, his eyes caught a brief glance of the view in his rear view mirror; something had come down out of the sky behind him with long flowing blonde hair, a flapping red cape and a womanly shape coming straight for him.

"Do you think he's still behind us?" Randy asked Earl. They heard a strange grinding noise and looked out the left side of their car. Cooley's huge Ford pick-up was now upside down and sliding forward on it's crushed cabin on its own momentum. Its four tires pointed skyward on that old highway; Earl and Randy's heads turned watching it slide past them, continuing to slide past them at eighty miles an hour and even overtake them on their left side. How the heck did that happen? Gradually slowing down, it finally stopped and caught on the railroad crossing before them. Earl drove past it in his Mustang just as the crossing lights started flashing and the bells started ringing. In the far distance, a faraway train sounded. Earl and his brother casually looked back at the wrecked car on the train tracks they were leaving behind. The train sounded again a bit closer. Earl slowed down a bit. Under the bells and flashing lights, he heard Cooley under the car screaming his head off and over that, he heard the roar of the train coming closer.

"Earl, why are you stopping?" Randy watched as Earl continued looking back.

The train sounded.

"I just got my karma back." Earl told his brother. "I ain't going to lose it now." He tossed his brother the key to the trunk. "Get the crowbar."

The train roared louder coming closer and Earl knew it. He raced back to the train tracks with the flipped truck and Cooley under it. The cab was right on the ground. The crushed window was barely wide enough for him to get through. Earl tried opening the door, but it was too mangled and distorted to come free that way. Cooley could feel the train tracks rattling up from under him. He couldn't see the train, but hear the train crossing flashing and the bells.

A train whistle sounded over the ridge.

"Earl, get me out of here!" He was going nuts. His heart pounded scared to death. His arms flailed and fought to get himself out from under his truck.

"I'm trying!" Earl took the crowbar from his brother and stuck it in between the door and the frame. He pulled heard on it. Randy pulled on it with his bare hands. The train roared louder. Randy saw lights from it in the distance.

"I wish we had the Jaws of Life!" Earl screamed.

"They're in the trunk!" Randy screamed back hysterical. The train whistle sounded on this side of the ridge.

"Well, go get them!" Earl continued trying with the crowbar, and Randy went to get another tool. Under his legs, Cooley looked out. Far in the distance, the far engine light came into view…

"Earl!"

"I'm trying!" Earl was getting scared. His hands were shaking. His pulse was racing! Someone tapped him on the shoulder. He looked over and saw the most beautiful girl he had ever seen.

"Excuse me, sweetie…" Dressed in that red cape and short red skirt with the huge red "S" across her chest, Bridget stepped in, grabbed the door in her hands and started pulling on it. Her fingers actually pierced the steel. Her hands reached around the door and pulled it, bent it and ripped it free with part of the frame. The train was barreling down on them. Earl grabbed Jimmy Cooley and pulled him free as a loud thunderous noise filled the air. The truck was no more. In its place charging through the crossing were hundreds of tons of huge Detroit steel fashioned as train cars just a few feet from them. Box cars covered in New York graffiti, train cars carrying automobiles, gas propane tanks, more box cars, empty flat beds, empty coal cars… they all roared by with huge gusts of wind tossed up by the underside of the speeding behemoth. Lying on his back, Earl watched the blonde goddess ascending up from the other side of the train. Randy stood over them carrying the hydraulic Jaws of Life. Their heads turning left and right, left and right, left and right watching the train speed past them.

"Earl…" Randy looked down on his brother. "Where do you want me to plug this in?"

"Earl…" Cooley started hugging Earl as the last of the train vanished past them. "You saved my life! You saved my life! You didn't have to, but you saved my life!" He stood up again hugging him again. "I'm so sorry for trying to shoot you."

"Well," Earl looked to his brother and back to Cooley. "I just got my karma back. I couldn't go losing it again." The crossing stopped flashing and the bells stopped clanging as even train sounds died away as it vanished into the darkness. "Sorry bout your truck."

"That's okay…" Cooley jovially pumped Earl to the shoulder. "I insured it for three times its worth! I'm gonna get me one of those Humvees!"

"That'll do it…" Earl heard the crickets again now that everything calmed down. "Want a ride back to your place?"

"No," Cooley looked back up the way. "I think I'll walk it."

"Well… More power to you." Earl looked back to his brother with the Jaws of Life. "That's the last name on my list. Let's go home, Randy."

"Earl…" Randy was looking around. "Did you see a girl in a long red cape around here?"